Cartman

All political parties right and left agreed to eradicate child poverty in Canada but efforts thus far have not been effective. Hopefully this new Parliament will make some progress. We should give them a chance.

As this is a potential merger and not a takeover, it could just as easily be said that Americans have lost their identity. We did not lose our culture when Labatt's was purchased by a foreign company and we will not lose it if/when Molson merges with Coors. Canadian culture is not based upon a commercial. Perhaps you spent too much time living in the US and should get your "information" from some place other than CNN or America's Most Wanted. Canadian culture is based upon values of unity through diversity, mutual respect and tolerance of difference and a belief in basic standards of living. Considering crime rates and incarceration rates in the United States, it seems fair to say that Americans hate Americans more than anyone else. Maybe that is why you were surprised that overt expressions of hatred were not evident. BTW...I hope that you did not demonstrate love for the US at a French restaurant. I have been to Germany and Latvia (the latter has a Canadian leader BTW) several times and disagree with you entirely.

At least Anderson is out...that makes us all winners to a certain extent. Now he is a real jerk. Please, please, please get rid of Anne next.

I would rather pay a Canadian a little too much of my tax $$ than give less to a foreign country. I agree with PFF that competition needs to be maintained and quality assured, but most unionists take pride in their work and I assume that Canadians can compete with everyone else.

I was talking to a couple of my students in education who worked in private schools and they said special needs students are treated much better than in the public system here in Alberta. I am not clear why this is the case though. It concerns me if our pubilc schools are not providing sufficient service to everyone considering we are all paying for it.

I think that regardless of what the feds do, people will continue to smoke dope anyways and have no problem getting it. When I was at an Xmas party at Science World in Van, there were dozens of people smoking dope (outside) in front of their bosses. In fact, they outnumbered tobacco smokers. I think that it probably should be legalized, but I wonder if it is even worth it. Perhaps the police should just take a hands off approach. Does anyone know of recent cases where the police have come down hard on someone? They do sometimes here in Alberta. I think BC is really liberal in this regard.

Taken out of context. In this quote, I am not suggesting we eliminate ALL levels of gov't of course. As we already have regional reps. in Ottawa and the Provinces really have little effect on the feds., I am not yet convinced that the regions would be any less well off in such a scheme.

A little better. http://www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/pr...=H&varYear=2001

This link is a little old. http://www.cbc.ca/news/indepth/background/...d/mpsalary.html

Let me get this straight Stoker. You are saying that eliminating government will cost more money? By your logic, we should create more levels of government. Sounds like something the right would like with their Big Brother mentality.

Well where should Eureka gets "facts" from? Arthur Anderson, Worldcom, Xerox, Tyco, Nortel, Enron? Need I say more? StatsCan seems as legit as any to me. Never ceases to amaze me how right wingers sling mud when their logic and evidence is inadequate. Keep slingin and you will win.

Nobody said it is likely to happen, just that it is a good idea economically. No, maintaining different standards of health and education for people due to place of residency is anti-Canadian. :angry: But the right seems to only care about what is fiscally conservative when it involves getting votes. This proposal is to reduce layers of gov't. Why is the right always interested in reducing gov't but never interested in eliminating the shameful senate? The Left wants to reduce an entire layer of gov't while the right wants to maintain it and you believe that the left holds a "Big Government ideology"?

I see your point, but are you aware that Saskatchewan exports a tremendous amount of fish (from fish farms)? Though I think that this gov't is as arrogant as ever, we should give them some benefit of the doubt. Because of the way he subverted democracy in his own party (placing his own hand picked candidates over constituency elected ones), I am very skeptical but willing to try out this minority situation.

This proposal makes sense. Health care services vary depending upon where you live. Many university students wonder why the same course in one province is not credited in another. This is sometimes the case within provinces etc. Splitting up the country like this does nothing to promote national unity and encourages levels of gov't to blame each other for mistakes. Seems to me that right wingers should be encouraging this tax cut. Why do we need city gov'ts, provinces, the feds and the senate? With majority fed. gov'ts, we always have the tyranny of the majority anyways and the provinces can do nothing about it. Waste.

I have gone through the exact same thing when living in BC. Thank goodness that I did not have to stress out over the cost of health care as well as the loss of a loved one. Keep your chin up.

What about the surplus? I cannot recall how much the Romanow Report demanded, but I thought that it was substantially less than the surplus. We do already nail vices for funding (huge taxes on booze and smokes). It is also my understanding that smokers save the system $$ because they die much earlier than others. I agree smoking is dumb but I would not restrict care. Just so you know, a major reason why smoking is so unhealthy is because of the pesticides used on these crops. These same pesticides are also found in your vegetables. In a natural state, tobacco does not normally contain Xenon 846 (just made that up of course). BTW, why is it that when a person deals drugs, they are the bad guys, but the tobacco/spirit industry is legit?

Discipline is lacking in schools today and teachers' hands are often tied. There are so many problem children with problem parents. The latter often consider schools merely to be dumping grounds. Sadly, few parents ever show up to meet their childrens' teachers who are often treated like scum as far as I am concerned. I do not see why your children should face any of this crap at either schools. If there is a problem, place the problem children in a more disciplined environment. Public education should not be regarded as a right and it should not be allowed to degrade because of the bad apples. As long as parents attend, I have no problem with using the strap. If people do not like that, then they should pay for their kids to go elsewhere or learn to discipline them!

As an Albertan, I hate to say it, but you are right. We have spent too much time trying to deny the existence of the problem (spinning it into a minor issue) and done little publicly to demonstrate that the problem is truly being solved. The media (CBC especially) should help with this effort. Both levels of gov't better get this solved quick 'cause how can you blame other countries for not wanting our meat products?

You cannot inject morality into the health care system. For one, what would you do about a person who has cancer, POSSIBLY from smoking? Without sufficient funds for treatment, would you just send them home to teach them a lesson (thatl learn 'em)? Considering many are terminally ill, should we make their families pay? Secondly, I could make a strong argument that people with a high BMI (fat) are living quite dangerously. Third, many people are inactive and drink alcohol or use other drugs. Fourth, many people drive too fast and expose themselves to very serious risk. You are putting yourself at a much higher risk when you do not drive safely than if you smoke. Why should I pay for the inactive fat person who drinks alcohol, smokes a fatty and drives like a maniac? These are all CHOICES. I bet that if we inject morality into the system, we could find a way to eliminate public health care altogether. Personally, I think that the government should just make tobacco illegal rather than carry on with this moral crusade. Who will be the next target of moral crusaders?

Was the Georgia Straight bought out by a larger company or are they independent?

As it is, I think that news in general competes with Jerry Springer for ratings. PBS news is not bad, but all media is biased to some extent. I do have a problem with them braodcasting the beheading but this will not happen on our airways.

A portion of their salaries are tax free. :angry:

If we operated the system in this manner, then I do not want to pay for people who eat at fast food restaurants or eat meat at all. I also do not want to pay for people who eat anything but organically grown foods. They are knowingly endangering their health. In my experience, it is doctors that cost the system too much money. They pull many stunts that increase costs such as getting you to come back for no apparent reason, forcing you to see a GP before seeing a specialist (when you know you only need to see the latter), or doing a full examination when you did not ask for it. There are also many prescriptions that should be over the counter but doctors like to make money from writing a note.

I guess we will see http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/07/15/jazeera040715

I can understand when a government does its best to estimate budget deficits/surpluses and makes minor measurement errors. No economist is perfect in a complex world. But, it really angers me that the feds. have taken far too much money from taxpayers, never consider returning it to them and then leave health care poorly funded. That is not "good government". User fees and premiums are not the best way to further fund health care because poorer people are disproportionately affected. It should be entirely funded through the income tax system which is a sliding tax system. I am not convinced that we have insufficient $$ to fund health care while we have a large surplus available. I would also like to see more accountability on the part of the provinces.